


goodbye to anyone

by CapyWritesShit



Series: in mourning we relearn ourselves [1]
Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Campaign 05: A Crown of Candy, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Minor Character Death, POV Multiple, amethar dies in the cathedral and it sucks for everyone, lapin and preston still die too though, no comfort :(, this is all sadness babyyyy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:08:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26363176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CapyWritesShit/pseuds/CapyWritesShit
Summary: There's a moment in every good man's life, where he has to make a hard choice. Amethar is not a good man, and he knows deep down that this choice has been made for him.[or: amethar dies in the cathedral fight. jet and ruby deal with the aftermath.]
Relationships: Amethar Rocks & Jet Rocks, Amethar Rocks & Ruby Rocks, Jet Rocks & Ruby Rocks
Series: in mourning we relearn ourselves [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1919164
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	goodbye to anyone

**Author's Note:**

> title from Goodbye to Anyone by Lily & Madeleine
> 
> from [this prompt bingo](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/nonbinarywithaknife/628623048242790400) made by [jack-day](https://nonbinarywithaknife.tumblr.com/)!

Sugar-sweet blood pounds in Amethar's head, gushes down his chest and out of his mouth and slicks up his hands, keeps his heart beating and beating and beating. His blood runs red, runs off his rock hard beard and drips onto the cathedral floor. His daughter runs behind him, grabs Liam and leaps out the shattered glass, thumping anticlimactically onto the stone below. He thinks he hears Theo say something but the blood in his ears makes him uncertain of anything he hears.

Ruby frantically looks around, her bow drawn and her expression manic. Sourpatch arrows sit on her fingers, itching to be shot, itching to sink into doughy skin and veggie bones. He's never seen her so rattled, but then again, Ruby's never been around battles like this before, where tactical retreats are the only chance for survival and everything else becomes moot.

There's a moment in every good man's life, where he has to make a hard choice. Amethar is not a good man, and he knows deep down that this choice has been made for him.

In one swift movement, Amethar sweeps Ruby up in his arms and tosses her out the window, watching her expression shift from manic to surprised to frightened to horrified in the seconds they make eye contact. She falls through the air, the sour arrows dissolving into sugar on the wind, and her bow clatters to the ground beside her when she hits the bottom.

And when he is certain she is safe, sitting on her butt and being helped up by Jet and Liam, all three children looking up to where he stands at the top of the drop, he turns away so he doesn't have to see their identical looks of fear. He hopes they will forgive him, for what he's about to do. He knows they won't.

King Amethar of House Rocks, first of his name, The Unfallen, braces himself and sprints off the balcony. The pristine pulp-stone floor cracks and explodes beneath his feet, sending up pebbles around him and cutting into his pink candy skin. Blood rushes in his ears, pumps through his veins, drips down his skin, slicks up his palms, blinds him momentarily before he's swinging his sword and screaming the rawest scream that burns in his throat and sends spit flying from his lips.

In the war, he would hear his comrades screaming with him, their rock candy shields clattering against their sugary weapons in the cacophonous war cry the Candians let out. Now, though, Amethar lets out his lone cry and charges, knowing he is fighting a losing battle. He does not intend to keep his title, The Unfallen, because it is only a testament for those he couldn't save.

Just this once, he thinks it must be better to fall than to watch those he loves die for him.

So, when he is struck down by Ceresian soldiers and Vegentanian knights alike, working in tandem to ensure his demise, he only feels vindication. Finally, finally, he is using his life for the good of his people, the good of his family. He doesn't have to weigh Caramelinda down, he doesn't have to hold Jet and Ruby back. He is Amethar Rocks, and he is using his head.

The light fades, and cherry red mixes with milky brown and cool pink on the floor, and King Amethar dies smiling, because what else is there to do in the face of ones greatest achievement?

* * *

Jet's lungs are on fire, her throat burns and her legs burn and her heart burns because her dad didn't come out of the cathedral and Lapin didn't, either, and the in few seconds she watched the Vegetanians and Ceresians slaughter them she felt something inside her crack. It wasn't long, though, before Theo was ripping her away, hissing about _he bought us time, we have to go, there's no time to mourn_ , but Jet can't process any of it because the crown on her pop's head was shattered on the ground, pieces scattered across the cathedral floor at the feet of the Pontifex herself.

If she wasn't so focused on running, on her feet hitting the pavement and her braid flying behind her and her sword swinging at her hip, maybe she'd have more time to check on Ruby and Liam. When she dove from the window, Liam in her arms, she'd hoped it counted for something. He had just seen his pig die, and Lapin had just died, and Liam is a naturally guilty person. She'd known he would blame himself, so she had held him tight and shoved all the love and care she could into their two second decent to the ground below.

She doesn't even know what happened to Ruby, but one second her twin was still standing in the cathedral and the next she was plummeting out the window, bow ripped from her hands and tears already springing to her eyes.

Ruby and Liam have always been more emotional than her, though. Jet's the oldest, the future King of Candia, she has to be the big sister that takes care of her little sister and little cousin. Ruby must be going through a lot, watching dad die like that. Liam must be going through a lot, watching Lapin and Preston die like that. Theo must be going through a lot, watching them all die like that.

Jet's not going through a lot. Jet's fine. She has to be ( _there's no time to mourn_ ), there's no reason not to be fine. Death happens all the time in war ( _he bought us time_ ), and this is what Jet's always wanted, right? A war to fight in? A moment to prove herself a good soldier ( _we have to go_ ) and a good leader? Jet Rocks, future King of Candia, is brought onto the throne much in the same way her father was—on the heels of a death she could not prevent, with a responsibility she does not want and has not earned.

The streets of Comida are dark in the early hours of the morning. The Bulb hasn't risen yet and graced the people with it's light. The last dredges of her sleepless night nip at Jet's eyelids and why, why, _why_ is she tired now? When it matters that she runs, runs for the lives she couldn't save, runs for the title she'll soon have, runs for the people she has to protect?

They pause in an alley behind a small shop, full of sweet Fructeran delicacies and sour dishes she's never gotten to try before. The first thing that happens is that Liam bursts into tears, and the second thing that happens is that Theo hushes him by frantically (and somehow still awkwardly) pulling him into a bone-crushing hug. The third thing that happens is that Ruby starts to cry, too, and the fourth thing that happens is that she shoves her face into Jet's shoulder and hugs her, and then there's two sets of people hugging and Jet feels something behind her eyes start to sting.

But she's not going to cry. There's no use crying for pops, who chose to do what he did. He wouldn't want her to cry for him—that's never been his thing.

No, Jet won't cry. She'll bottle up her cries and turn them into roars, and she'll turn her sadness to rage and her fear to conviction. Jet has a purpose, as King of Candia, and it's to avenge the fallen Amethar Rocks. Not a single person will be spared, because Jet is kind, but there's only so much a King can forgive before she sets a bad example.

And Jet will be the best King Candia has ever had the pleasure of knowing.

* * *

In all the history books Ruby never read, war was always described so distantly. The casualties were nameless, the numbers were inconceivable, the enemies were faceless and the battles were just words on a page. She's starting to think she should've paid Lapin's lessons a little more attention, because then maybe she would've understood a little better, maybe she would've known more.

Jet's hand is warm in hers, and the force of her grip is grounding. Her tears are sticky on her face, her clothes are ripped and itchy, her head is loud and crowded with thoughts of things that she doesn't have time to pay more attention to. The loudest thought, though, is that Lazuli is still in her reflection, but it provides her no comfort.

Lapin's final note is clenched in one hand and as soon as Jet lets her go to start running, Ruby thinks she may never let go of the note. She wants the final piece of the man she never respected, never gave a single extra thought about because she thought he was stuck up and prissy and annoying. She wants his final piece because she wants to prove she respects him, even it it took far too much to get there.

She wishes she had something left of her dad. Unfortunately, his crown is no longer salvageable, and all his belongings are either on his limp body or in his personal quarters at home. For what feels like the first time in a long time, Ruby wishes she could hug her dad. He'd give the best hugs, warm and all encompassing and almost like the physical embodiment of his love.

Pops had never been good with words, and Ruby thinks it's because he never had to be, before the war, but when he'd hug her tight and strong, she could tell it was with everything he had. She can feel it now, the warmth. Even in the cold of the brisk morning air, she can feel it.

Jet is warm, she thinks. Jet's warm and Jet's all encompassing and Jet's full of love and Jet's king now, probably. Ruby doesn't really want Jet to be king. It's like the doomed fate of all the royalty of Candia—they die horrific deaths, during war, and whoever is left in the end is forced to pick up the pieces until they eventually die, too, always with a crown atop their heads and a trail of survivors guilt behind them.

Maybe her mom will die soon, too. Ruby hopes not. She doesn't think she'll be able to handle mom and dad dying so close together, not if Jet is to become king and die a gruesome death, too. Not when the throne will fall into her lap and the dagger will pierce her heart and she'll have seen it coming miles away, but she'll have been powerless to stop it.

Ruby gets in her head a lot. She's getting in her head now because Lapin is dead and Preston is dead and _her dad is dead_. She can't lose anyone else, she _can't_ , she doesn't have it in her to, Ruby has so little resilience in her because she's not The Unfallen, she's nothing like her aunts or her parents or her sister, and can't handle the weight of the world crashing down on her like they all can.

The light of the Bulb washes over her as it crests over the horizon, but it does not bring her hope. All she can see is the day ahead of her and all the ways she knows she won't be able to get through it. Jet pulls them into an alley and Liam punches Thad and Ruby casts _Disguise Self_ but none of it means anything because her pops is _dead_ and she knows she won't be next, but she can't bring herself to accept who will be.

**Author's Note:**

> i have never once edited a single piece ive written EVER and i refuse to start now
> 
> thank for reading, check out my [tumblr](https://theswirlersisterscircus.tumblr.com)!!


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